When Gov. Steve Beshear replaced the Rev. Kevin Cosby on the University of Louisville’s Board of Trustees last month, he did more than remove his only African-American appointment on the board. He also removed his only appointee who has not been a strong and steady contributor to Beshear’s political causes. Note: You’ll love seeing Terry Sebastian deliberately and purposefully lie to Tom Loftus. [C-J/AKN]

Could an excess of caution hurt Hillary Clinton? This query is coming to the fore again after she dodged a question on Tuesday over whether she supports or opposes building the Keystone XL Pipeline. It’s like watching the Grimes Campaign on a national stage. [The Hill]

Kentucky Agriculture Commissioner James Comer says food stamp benefits can be used at an increasing number of farmers’ markets in the state. Which means ignorant people in, say, West Liberty are going to scream about how all benefits recipients ought to be drug tested. [WLKY]

Some Republicans gleefully scripted Donald Trump’s political obituary in the wake of his scathing comments about Sen. John McCain’s military service earlier this month, hoping that his freewheeling presidential campaign had finally imploded. [Reuters]

Republican Matt Bevin said Tuesday that if elected governor he would not immediately end the state’s expansion of eligibility for the federal-state Medicaid program, contrary to what he said for months. [Al Cross]

In the US, poverty, deprivation and exploitation draw thousands of its own children down into a dark underworld that offers few ways out. [BBC]

Rowan County argued it is “immune from suit” and that a recent federal lawsuit against the county and its clerk Kim Davis fails to find fault with the county government since Davis decided not to issue marriage licenses last month. [Ashland Independent]

Senator Rand Paul is invested in a fund that would skyrocket in value if the United States economy were to default. He’d also like your vote for president. [The Nation]

Christopher D. Steward, a former Barren County magistrate, was served with an arrest warrant early Thursday morning and charged with third-degree terroristic threatening, fourth-degree assault (minor injury) and menacing, according to documents released by the Barren County Sheriff’s Office. [Glasgow Daily Times]

It’s not easy being the DEA these days. After an unprecedented losing streak on Capitol Hill, the once-untouchable Drug Enforcement Administration suffered last week what might be considered the ultimate indignity: A Senate panel, for the first time, voted in favor of legal, recreational marijuana. [Higdon/Politico]

Convenient that this AP story doesn’t mention that people dressed up as Native Americans will chase you for a fee. Because Kentucky can’t do anything without a touch of racism, apparently. [H-L]

Seven in 10 homeowners who apply for help under the federal government’s signature mortgage aid program are rejected, according to a government report released Wednesday. The program, called the Home Affordable Modification Program, is meant to help homeowners who are at risk of foreclosure stay in their homes by reducing their monthly mortgage. [HuffPo]

An internal review of Louisville Metro Police Department’s use of force procedures released Monday found its policy largely reflects national and international guidelines. [C-J/AKN]

In response to the Supreme Court’s historic marriage equality ruling, conservative media has endorsed a newly proposed federal bill called the “First Amendment Defense Act” (FADA). Though conservatives have touted FADA as an effort to protect religious liberty, critics warn the bill would undermine the government’s ability to combat anti-gay discrimination. [MMFA]

The Ashland Board of City Commissioners voted to reverse a decision to give themselves a three precent cost-of-living raise because of “technical concerns,” City Attorney John Vincent said. [Ashland Independent]

Ori Zoller made headlines over a decade ago selling thousands of AK-47s that eventually found their way into the hands of terrorists in Colombia. Now, according to recently leaked documents, the former small arms dealer is working as cyber arms dealer, supplying the government of Honduras with powerful surveillance tools used to spy on computers and cell phones. [The Intercept]

The Kentucky State Police and the state Office of Highway Safety are teaming up to promote safe driving behavior to protect people in emergency or public safety vehicles. [WKYT]

Will the Kentucky Department of Juvenile Justice give in to a literal hate group? [ThinkProgress]

The case of Adam Horine, the mentally ill Kentucky man removed from jail and put on a bus to Florida by Carrollton police earlier this year, continues to grow in complexity. He now faces a criminal charge of groping a woman in a northern Kentucky hospital. [WFPL]

For several years, a handful of lawmakers in Congress have tried to scale back tough sentencing laws that have bloated federal prisons and the cost of running them. But broad-based political will to change those laws remained elusive. [NY Times]

Pluto would appear to have glaciers of nitrogen ice, the latest pictures from the New Horizons probe suggest. [BBC]

A former lawmaker accused of sexual harassment and the former head of the Legislative Research Commission made payments to settle sexual harassment and hostile workplace lawsuits filed by three female legislative staffers, House Speaker Greg Stumbo said Monday. [H-L]

The Boy Scouts of America voted Monday to lift a long-established ban on gay adults as employees and volunteers within the organization. [HuffPo]

Of course Greg Fischer’s stunt broke state law. Did anyone ever expect this man to truly be transparent? To truly be up-front? Please. Not even the Brown Family is in his corner. First-rate shyster that the Democrats are afraid to oust. The news director of WAVE-3 is accusing Louisville Mayor Greg Fischer of violating Kentucky’s open meetings law after banning photographs and video footage during a press briefing to review new designs for the downtown Omni Hotel project. [C-J/AKN]

The Senate on Sunday rejected a GOP-led amendment to repeal ObamaCare that fell several votes short of a 60-vote threshold to advance. [The Hill]

Pension spikes have become the city’s newest finance problem, and the board of commissioners is wondering how to handle this unbudgeted expense. [Ashland Independent]

The Associated Press is making thousands of hours of archival news footage available on YouTube. [NPR]

One of the defining characteristics of democracy in the 21st century is that nearly every member of the public can watch the government in action. Through live broadcasts and daily TV news reports, citizens can see and hear the deliberations and decisions that affect their daily lives. [WAVE3]

The U.S. government is violating a 1997 settlement by detaining unauthorized immigrant children, and an order may be forthcoming to require the release of the minors and parents detained with them, a judge in California has ruled. [Reuters]

A death investigation is underway in Bell County after a man was bitten by a snake Sunday during a church service. [WKYT]

Studies have shown time and again that humans are pretty effective at driving other animals to extinction — but a new study published in Science this week suggests that when it comes to some species, that blame might have been misplaced. [ThinkProgress]

Climate change will begin to have a demonstrative effect on Kentucky’s economy within five years. [WFPL]

New York state recently announced an increase in the minimum wage for fast food workers, to $15 an hour. It’s the fruit of a three-year labor campaign. But there’s another group of workers out there that hasn’t had a real wage increase in decades. [NPR]

Wealthy libertarians are giving big to Republican presidential candidate Rand Paul. Three super PACs supporting the Kentucky senator say they raised a combined $6 million through June 30. [H-L]

President Barack Obama freed dozen of nonviolent offenders earlier this month to draw attention to the harsh and often unfair sentences given under mandatory minimum sentencing rules for drug offenders. [HuffPo]

Steve Robertson, chairman and executive director of the Kentucky Republican Party, is taking a job next month with a public affairs firm in Lexington. [H-L]

We’re still trying to eliminate sweatshops and child labor by buying right. But that’s not how the world works in 2015. [HuffPo]

Churchill Downs Inc., having bet on the future of free games played online, is asking a federal judge to dismiss a case that contends those games are illegal casino gambling. [C-J/AKN]

At a roundtable in New York on Tuesday, Democratic presidential candidate and former Gov. Martin O’Malley (D) released his immigration platform for “New Americans,” announcing that he would go further than President Obama on immigration policies by enacting sweeping reforms to provide deportation relief for undocumented immigrants. [ThinkProgress]

It’s not ginseng harvest season, but that’s not stopping some people from taking this uncommon plant. [Ashland Independent]

A new law is beginning in Kentucky that allows motorcyclists to run red lights. [WHAS11]

In a video released Wednesday night, multiple police officers seem to be holding 28-year-old Sandra Bland to the ground while she cries out, “You just slammed my head into the ground, do you not even care about that?” Three days later, Bland was found dead in a jail cell. [ThinkProgress]

A company owned by Republican candidate for Kentucky governor Matt Bevin has been delinquent on its property taxes multiple times and is currently listed as “not in good standing” in Maine. [WAVE3]

Closed committee meetings are typically wonkish, routine affairs. But Friday’s session of Republicans on the House Financial Services Committee broke that pattern in spectacular fashion, laying bare the growing acrimony and sense of disorder within the House Republican Conference. [Politico]

A controversial project that called for logging and burning to improve forest health at Land Between The Lakes has been canceled. [WLEX18]

The US and Russia are among five countries to have signed a deal to prevent commercial fishing in the melting Arctic sea ice near the North Pole. [BBC]

A 30 percent jump in fatal drug overdoses in Fayette County last year contributed to a statewide increase in drug-related deaths, state officials reported Wednesday. [H-L]

Washington has delayed highway funds so long even red states are raising gas taxes. [HuffPo]

Homophobic coward Kim Davis didn’t have the guts to show up in court yesterday. She hid out, tried to avoid being served, played the typical hate-filled victim role. [Deep Gay Thoughts]

Engaged couples in Rowan County will have to wait a little longer to get married. U.S. District Court Judge David Bunning will continue a hearing next week over Rowan County Clerk Kim Davis’ decision to stop issuing marriage licenses to anyone because of her personal objections to same-sex marriage. [H-L]

Police departments across the country that have spent years boasting about plummeting crime numbers are now scrambling to confront something many agencies have not seen in decades: more bloodshed. [HuffPo]

University of Louisville President James Ramsey last year was paid 2 ½ times more than the average of the Atlantic Coast Conference’s other 14 presidents and chancellors — all of whose universities are ranked far higher academically than U of L. [C-J/AKN]

Scores of Democrats are calling on President Obama to champion an expansion of Social Security benefits for millions of seniors nationwide. [The Hill]

Kentucky’s electricity generation landscape will look drastically different in the next five years, as coal-fired power plants retire or convert to natural gas. [WFPL]

U.S. presidential candidate Hillary Clinton took swipes at Wall Street and her Republican rivals on Monday, promising to impose tougher regulations on banks and raise the wages of ordinary Americans if she wins the 2016 White House race. [Reuters]

The white church on the corner of Main Street and Prestonsburg Street here has officially returned. [Ashland Independent]

Climate change is threatening the survival of bumblebees, significantly reducing the habitats in which they can survive, researchers say. [BBC]

City commissioners agreed Monday night to continue working with the insurance company it has previously done business with, but one commissioner asked whether the city solicited bids for coverage. [Glasgow Daily Times]

When Chuck Rosenberg took the top job at the Drug Enforcement Administration two months ago, the longtime prosecutor had a reputation as “Mister Fix It.” [NPR]

Jimmy Hogg, Somerset budget director for the past 21 years, will be proposed as Richmond city manager at Tuesday’s city commission meeting. [Richmond Register]

Coming to Kentucky before you know it? Probably. Since Steve and Andy are tight with the payday loan sharks. [ThinkProgress]

Last spring, Marc H. Morial, the president of the National Urban League, found himself in a place he has come to know well over the years, across a desk from Sen. Mitch Mc-Connell, the majority leader, talking about public policy. [H-L]

Pope Francis left for Rome on Sunday at the end of a trip to South America during which he censured capitalism, championed the rights of the poor, warned of irreversible damage to the planet and urged youths to “make a mess.” [HuffPo]

Watching these gay-panicked folks scramble to come up with ways to discriminate is tons of fun. [H-L]

Washington state raked in more than $70 million in taxes during its first year of legal and regulated marijuana sales. [HuffPo]

Despite hugely important state legislative elections in his home state, Rand Paul’s political action committee made more donations of more money in New Hampshire in 2014 than in Kentucky. [C-J/AKN]

Universal child care is becoming a central pillar of the liberal agenda — one that, if it is ever realized, could take its place alongside some of the great progressive reforms of the 20th Century, and possibly the Affordable Care Act, as a defining achievement of the Democratic Party. [WaPo]

Members of the Ashland Rotary Club gave a warm welcome to the new CAReS director Monday as she gave an update on the organization and future events. [Ashland Independent]

More than 150,000 U.S. families are homeless each year. The number has been going down, in part because of a program known as rapid rehousing, which quickly moves families out of shelters and into homes. [NPR]

It seems that all eyes have been on Rowan County in the past week as County Clerk, Kim Davis defied the U.S. Supreme Court ruling that there is a constitutional right to same-sex marriage. [The Morehead News]

In the great trade debate last month, the air was filled with promises to help American workers keep pace with a changing world. Days after, the Senate Appropriations Committee approved new Republican cuts from funding for adult education and worker training — programs the GOP had embraced just a year ago. [Politico]

This Fall, 69 Lexington homeowners will see an increase in their property tax. The properties were on the final list generated by the vacant property review commission to help rid the city of eyesores. [WKYT]

With coal trains chugging past in the distance, Jack Perry watches as his wife, Margie, plants row upon row of Hungarian pepper seedlings in the community garden that residents of this West Virginia coal town call the “Garden of Eatin’.” [Reuters]

Three Louisville lawmakers wrote a letter to Jefferson County Public Schools superintendent Donna Hargens on Monday raising “grave concerns” over the hiring of the district’s former lawyer as a teacher at Central High School. [WDRB]

Donald Trump doubled down on his controversial comments about illegal immigration from Mexico on Monday, saying that “infectious disease is pouring across the border.” [The Hill]

Prediction: this won’t end well. The Kentucky Board of Education hopes to have by early August a short list of eight to 10 candidates for Kentucky’s next education commissioner, board chairman Roger Marcum said Monday. [H-L]

U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton said Tuesday that Puerto Rico’s public entities should be able to use U.S. bankruptcy laws to restructure some $72 billion in debt. [HuffPo]

About 550 engineers in the state Transportation Cabinet got raises averaging 20 percent last month in hopes of curbing high turnover and costly contracts for private engineers. [H-L]

Iraqi Shi’ite fighters and army troops made gains north of Falluja on Sunday but their efforts to seal off Islamic State militants in the city met heavy resistance, including suicide bomb attacks, army sources and militia fighters said. [HuffPo]

Aetna’s acquisition of Humana appears to be part of a merger frenzy as the five biggest U.S. health insurers look to get bigger. But any acquisition or merger of this proportion must overcome potential hurdles. [C-J/AKN]

The News-Enterprise has finally stopped discriminating on the basis of sexual orientation. [News-Enterprise]

When the official watchdog overseeing U.S. spending on Afghanistan asked the U.S. Agency for International Development recently for details about the 641 health clinics it funds there, the agency readily provided a list of geospatial coordinates for them. But when the office of the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR) went looking for the $210 million worth of clinics, the majority of them weren’t there. [The Intercept]

Mitch McConnell didn’t offer a Commerce Lexington lunch crowd many surprises or much real news, but he offered a couple of insights into his own political thinking Thursday. [Ronnie Ellis]

New data on payments from drug and device companies to doctors show that many doctors received payments on 100 or more days last year. Some received payments on more days than they didn’t. [ProPublica]

Par for the course in the Beshear Administration but Democrats don’t want to talk about that. The hiring of a Kentucky cabinet official’s husband has been questioned by critics who say the hiring represents a conflict of interest and a misuse of funds that could be better spent on helping overworked and underpaid social workers. [WKYT]

Mitch McConnell is still an obstructionist but that’s something Republicans don’t want to talk about. [Politico]

Republican presidential candidate Rand Paul has fashioned himself as one of the fledgling legal marijuana industry’s greatest advocates on Capitol Hill. That’s why he’s in a prime position to ask cannabis business leaders for campaign donations. Last week, he did just that. [WFPL]

Bipartisan legislation that would make changes to No Child Left Behind will be up for debate in Congress this week. [ThinkProgress]

Let the racist bigots fly their flags. Makes it easier to identify people to cut out of your life. [H-L]

Hillary Clinton had an incredible response for a gay child who expressed fears about what his future might hold. [HuffPo]

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